Have a question for Tim?

Maybe Moorad could have prevented the San Francisco Giants from signing the out-of-work outfielder by overruling his brain trust on behalf of a former client. Maybe the Padres lost a division title because of an excess of ethics.

“In retrospect, I wish I’d done more than relay Pat Burrell’s interest in coming here.” Moorad said Thursday afternoon. “I’m not going to tell (General Manager) Jed (Hoyer) what to do and I’m not going to push a particular player on him. (But) in retrospect, I wish I had raised the possibility to a different level.”

Formerly Burrell’s agent and still his friend, Moorad recognized a conflict of interests when the Tampa Bay Rays released the slumping slugger last May. Moorad wanted to help Burrell find work, but without overstepping his expertise or forsaking his scruples.

“I’m absolutely guilty of viewing Pat as a friend,” Moorad said, “and didn’t want to be the least bit heavy-handed as a result.”

Pity. Despite the general consensus that Burrell’s bat had slowed to an overmatched crawl, he would swat 18 home runs for the Giants in 96 games — seven of them go-ahead shots, five in the eighth inning or later — and was credited with nine game-winning RBI. Burrell provided the Giants with the kind of comprehensive pennant insurance Hoyer & Co. were seeking when they acquired Ryan Ludwick from St. Louis.

Hindsight is hell.

“Jeff was absolutely right about Pat,” Hoyer said Thursday. “In hindsight, I wish he had pushed harder.”

Baseball being a game of percentages rather than perfection, regrets are part of the deal. Nobody gets them all right, and among the disadvantages of a low-end payroll is that you can’t always afford the risk of being wrong. The daunting financial disparity between ballclubs that are ostensibly competing with each other was hammered home Thursday when the Giants left pitcher Barry Zito and his $126 million contract off the roster for their playoff series against Atlanta.

Four days removed from his team’s elimination in San Francisco, Moorad is not yet willing to watch the playoffs, and he is further distancing himself this week with a trip to Vietnam. Yet he remains “bullish” and buoyant on the subject of his ballclub, and “pleasantly pleased” at the progress he perceives in the stands at Petco Park.

“Much was made of the non-capacity crowds toward the end of the season compared to other cities,” Moorad said. “I told everyone who asked: ‘Look, this is a community that needs to see and believe.’ I believe they’ve now seen a bit and they’re beginning to believe. … At this point, I think the direction is clearer, if not clear, and we believe the fan base is responding.”

Moorad says Padres’ season tickets plunged from 15,000 to 8,600 between 2008 and 2009, so the return to 2 million in home attendance represents a meaningful step toward stability. To ensure that that trend continues in 2011, the Padres have increased the number of game-day seats available for less than $14 from 802 to 8,074. To compensate for the lost revenue of cheaper cheap seats, the club is raising the price on some of its higher-end inventory.

“I think it would be presumptuous to assume we’re coming out of a recession at this point,” Moorad said. “I think, if anything, this region continues to be challenged. We’ll be sensitive to that as we price our options going forward.”

Overall, Moorad said, the Padres’ revenues were relatively flat in 2010. Though the team’s announced home attendance rose by 212,171 — a per-game rise of 2,619 over 2009 — much of that reflected a fan migration to lower-priced tickets.

So while Hoyer can expect to deploy a larger payroll in 2011, the difference will not be dramatic. Moorad said the first payroll number would be a “4,” as in $40 million. Presumably, that means no new contract for Adrian Gonzalez unless the bulk of the dollars are deferred.

“At this point, I expect him to be on our roster next season,” Moorad said of his All-Star first baseman. “I think Jed’s committed to sit down with (agent) John Boggs at some point and I’m sure we’ll get a feel about Adrian’s view of the future. Beyond that, our position hasn’t changed.

“While we’d still love to have Adrian here long-term, it doesn’t appear to be practical from a financial standpoint. So I’m certainly not counting on that. But we’ll engage and see if there’s a deal that can be made.”

He was seated behind a circular desk in his memorabilia-filled office, eating a salad out of a plastic container, fielding questions with a fork. If Moorad has suffered for the sins of John Moores, he is bearing up well under that burden. He said that he still plans to complete his purchase of the Padres before the deal’s 2014 deadline, though probably not in the next year.

“We’re likely to only have one more (payment),” Moorad said. “Our preference would be to do it sooner rather than later, (but) we’ll likely continue to enjoy the (inflationary) benefits of the deal over the next year and a half.”

Having parlayed an ownership stake in the Arizona Diamondbacks into a more prominent role with the Padres, Moorad was asked if he might be inclined to trade up again should divorce force the sale of the Los Angeles Dodgers.

“I’ve been asked (about that) by a number of people,” Moorad said. “I’m committed to San Diego. That’s not going to change.